[Page 1: PC Review] [Page 2: Console Review]

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (PS2, XBX, GC)
We're Just Wild About Harry!
By Susie Vee

PLATFORM: PC

PUBLISHER: EA Games

DEVELOPER: EA Games

GENRE: Action

ESRB: Everyone

SCORE:

We’re just wild about Harry. Can you blame us? Not only is Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets a better film then its predecessor, the requisite tie-in video games are big improvements as well.

Once again, the PC and console titles are completely separate products. Both roughly follow the plot of the film/book, but the console version emphasizes platform-style action, while the PC game is more along the lines of an FPS-style action/adventure.

The Playstation 2, Xbox and Game Cube versions of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets are for the most part identical. There’s very little graphical difference between them, although the PS2 version seems to have long load times and is missing some of the flashier particle effects.

All three versions have solid cartoony graphics and characters that are more reminiscent of the book illustrations than the films. The game does, however let a few details fall between the cracks, and you’ll notice some repetitive textures in areas.

Broken up into daylong segments, each day will find Harry with a set of tasks to complete to move the story along. As usual, you’ll try to collect magic jellybeans along the way – they’re used to buy special items. But in truth, we had a hard time holding onto our beans, as getting touched by an enemy sends them spilling across the floor, where they often vanish before you can pick them up again.

Hogwarts is vast and has many branching paths and tons of areas to explore. We especially liked the non-linear nature of the game, where you could go off and check out whatever areas of the school grounds interested you. But thanks to a fairly useless map, we were sometimes at a loss as to where to go next to complete the current objective.

We did, however appreciate the simple but effective save system, which more games would do well to adopt. Every time we hit a save point, the game would ask us if we wanted to save, then take care of the rest of the details behind the scenes. No asking us which memory card location to use, or which slot to overwrite.

There’s nothing more distracting than having to hit the same button five or six times to complete a simple save (“Are you sure you want to save?” “Are you really sure?”). you know what we’re talking about.

Some tasks are fun and engaging, while a few seemed there just to pad the game’s running time. Fighting the Whomping Willow near the beginning of the film, for example, is a segment that went on far too long.

While the stars of the film didn’t do the voices for the game, all the major characters still come off quite well, and the whole title has an air of mainstream polish that the Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone games lacked.

Harry Potter seems like good fare for boys and girls of all ages, although we’d have liked to see a little more of our favorite over-achiever, Hermione. Harry's world seems much more male-centric than the one presented in the books and films, and that's a shame.

[Page 1: PC Review] [Page 2: Console Review]